Vibrating screen separators are used in industry for a variety of undertakings. Vibrating screen separators are used to process dry materials and liquid/solid slurries. Each vibrating screen separator typically functions by first introducing a flow of material to a porous element such as a screen or filter usually of a woven wire mesh or a porous membrane. The flow of material is separated into two streams one containing material that passes through the porous element the other containing material that is too large to pass through the porous element. A drive mechanism may be operatively coupled with a housing to produce a vibrating motion that serves to put the material on the porous element in motion until it either passes through or is pushed off the element at the periphery thereof.
Vibrating screen separators employ screens of rectangular and also of circular forms with screen elements, tensioned frames or with hooks tensioned onto the separator itself.
The screen elements also referred to as screen panels range greatly in porosity and can be of a single element or of laminates. The separator frames are usually vibratory and are normally supported by a variety of elastic elements such as springs, bushings and/or links. During the use of vibrating screen separators screen panels eventually will fail due to normal wear and tear. In the case of a failure with screen panels normally the entire panel must be replaced in order to effect the repair.
There is a need for a modular screen panel system wherein individual screen modules can be replaced rather than the entire screen panel when a failure occurs.